


Please Hold (me) (real tight)

by sprinkles888



Category: Rise of the Guardians (2012)
Genre: Families of Choice, Fluff, Found Family, Friendship, Gen, Gen Work, Gift Fic, Guardians of Childhood References, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Minor Violence, Platonic Cuddling, Platonic Relationships, Sleep, Story/Mood Playlist Available, off-screen violence, rotgsecretsanta2017
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-25
Updated: 2017-12-25
Packaged: 2019-02-20 04:49:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,714
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13139409
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sprinkles888/pseuds/sprinkles888
Summary: They're all a little stupid when it comes to things like emotions and friendship.Or: The Guardians figure out how to be a team, how to be friends, and how to be a family.Because okay is different from happy.





	Please Hold (me) (real tight)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [WritLarge](https://archiveofourown.org/users/WritLarge/gifts).



> Oh boyyyyyy
> 
> Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to everybody, but especially WritLarge, who's the recipient of the story for RotG Secret Santa 2017! It's not as much of a secret, considering the fact that you organized this entire incredibly thing, but I hope you enjoy it!
> 
> So...you know when you get a prompt for a story and you immediately know what you want to write, and it's proooobably only going to be about 1500 words, but then things go sideways and the story's tripled in size and you've made a playlist for it and it's four am and you're contemplating the downsides and implications of immortality?
> 
> That was this fic.
> 
> Playlist available [here](https://open.spotify.com/user/ilovebooks8/playlist/1i2Ts54xJeSk4ycakdxcFT) if you like to jam to music as much as I do.
> 
> p.s. also??? my writing style has recently taken a severe turn into "Write a bunch of snippets and let the readers read between the lines", and I'd apologize except for the fact that I kind of like it.
> 
> edits 12/18/18 for clarity etc.

 

 

It was easy to like earth. It wasn’t so easy to love it.

He’d made his home here, somehow, over the years. It bloomed green and pink and brown and bright. There were colors that the human eye would never be able to see hidden throughout, making the flowers burst and the trees pop.

He almost hated it.

It was a little too much like _home_. Just like a long ago place, hidden now as a ruin among the galaxies.

Sometimes he’d hop by a certain plant or patch of grass and be hit by sudden emotion - overwhelming and painful and just like the melodramatic apes he’d found himself surrounded by.

Too much chocolate would do that, he supposed.

Humans weren’t half bad though. They enjoyed spring and chocolate and other important things when they weren’t busy dying or fighting wars or having strange celebrations. If he’d come here of his own violation, he probably would have enjoyed himself immensely. As it was, he found himself clinging to a past that should have lessened its hold on him long ago. He donned his robe and slid glasses on his nose, trying to ignore the gray tint that had started to make itself known throughout his fur.

It was fine. He was fine.

 

OoOoO

 

Phil was not fine. Christmas was not fine.

And North...was somehow drunk on eggnog again.

It’s one thing for a children’s holiday figure to drink casually during his off time. It’s quite another when that holiday figure has somehow consumed enough spirits to make him and his large figure stumble when trying to _stand up_ . _On the run up to the most important time of year_.

North, drunk, was a sap. A sad, miserable, nostalgic sap. And Phil simply did not have time for any of it.

“I am not...a good person! For the children! "Я ужасный человек!” North said, hiccupping before trying once again to fumble his way to the door where Phil stood, frowning.

“I used to - steal! I am a ruined man,” He gestured wildly, “Who am I to...take charge of Christmas?”

Phil sighed, eyeing the mug by North’s chair, still half full.

“I am... nothing. Not really,” North said, slumping against a wall, making shelves shake and books threaten to thump to the ground.

There were tears. Phil was not good with tears.

He ducked his head back out into the hallway as mutterings and sobs continued to fill the room. Phil placed another yeti on North duty as he went back to his job, shaking his head grimly as his coworkers glanced at him with hope in their exhausted eyes. He had no good news to bear.

 

OoOoO

 

Sanderson Mansnoozie, was, by his very nature, a contemplative being. He was often surrounded by silence and clouds, left alone with his children’s dreams.

Often, he found himself lost in memory, as one as old as he was wont to do. Later (much later) he would wonder if he played any part in mankind’s dreams of the stars and longing for the great vastness of the universe. His own memories of them had found their way into many a child’s dream.

A grounded Star Captain was never truly grounded, of course, but even he sometimes longed for a greater space, for the deep reaches of a galaxy and the speed of a ship.

Sometimes, he longed for a rest, for sleep.

For company.

Reaching out to others, especially the baffling humans he’d come to consider almost-friends, was not something he was familiar with. A Star Captain’s life was often lonely in ways, though that had, once upon a time, been a concept Sanderson would have never understood.

He wondered if it was Emily or the lingering effect of proximity to humanity that made him think about finding others to be around.

Or perhaps, it was something else.

 

OoOoO

  


She was well aware that memories can be painful.

She had her own to attest to that.

But memories became her mantra - her safety. Memories are her and she is memory.

Sometimes, she was sure that they would swallow her up, drown her in their pain and love and hope and hurt and wonder and ache and dreams. Memories are the children’s fallback - when they grow old, it’s what they have to cling to. She is what stands between forgetfulness and the importance of childhood memory.

She was also the one to understand fully that sometimes those memories aren’t always wanted.

 

OoOoO

 

Jack found that he liked to pretend. It was easy, and it let him believe, for a little bit of time, that he wasn’t an invisible, purposeless void wandering the world and bringing snow with him.

It only took him a couple of decades to realize that the snow fell with his mood.

And perhaps that was the problem, he mused as he curled on the roof of yet another building, dragging his cloak to cover his shoulders - he didn’t know anything. He was put there by the moon, left to puzzle things out on his own and try to find his own answers.

Some years he was certain that the moon was probably his worst enemy.

Other years, he knew that it was himself.

He got in his own way, annoying the few other spirits who’d ever bothered to talk with him - making fun of them, messing things up.

He had a _reputation_. Which, he supposed, was better than no one knowing his name, but was a deterrent for acquaintanceship of any kind. He was the bothersome winter spirit with the bad attitude and poor sportsmanship.

It was just so easy to laugh and mess around - at least, easier than admitting he cared so much to the point that he couldn’t risk trying to make friends on any level other than superficial. His reputation became his facade, and there was no going back.

 

OoOoO

  


The party is loud enough that Jack can hear it through the window panes. North is loud, as usual, and Tooth is even chattier than normal. There’s music playing and yetis lumbering about while elves dance.

Jack is out on a balcony, just breathing and listening to the the news the wind carries on its back.

“Crikey, it’s freezing out here,” Bunny startles him by pushing the door open with his foot, “Don’t know how you stand it.”

“Kind’va winter-based spirit over here,” Jack says wryly, watching Bunny shiver. He’s got a slightly startled look in his eyes like that of the just-woken-up and it makes him seem...softer. A little less boomerang-happy than normal.

Bunny rolls his eyes but nods gratefully as Jack nudges the wind to bring the warmer currents Bunny’s way.

“What’re you doing out here?” Jack questions, kicking his foot a bit as it hangs over the edge of the balcony.

Bunny leans forward and rests his arms on the balcony, putting the top of his ears at the same level as Jack’s shoulders, “Was going to ask you the same question.”

Jack shrugs, “It’s a bit...much.”

There’s a snort, and he knows almost exactly what Bunny is going to say before the, “That’s North for you,” even leaves his mouth.

“Yeah,” Jack says, softly, suddenly wanting to reach out and poke the cheek fluff so near his hand. He manages to overcome the urge, but it’s still there, hidden.

A silence comes over them - a little awkward, a little too full of _stuff._ Things between the two of them have thawed a bit over time, especially as Jack has gone through the newly mandated-by-North training for Guardianship, but sometimes they find themselves at an impasse.

Jack is sure that it it’s his fault - he’s not reaching out or offering any topics of conversation - but he doesn’t quite know what to do about it. His mouth has a bad habit of betraying him by letting way-too-personal-to-be-sharing-freely information out around people he actually didn’t want to know all the problematic things about him (the Guardians) or others who don’t care about him or his feelings one bit (the spirits who like to rough him up over his Guardianship). He can’t risk reaching out to Bunny without revealing more about himself than he was comfortable with, and he can’t make things less awkward around them without reaching out. He’s in a loop.

He doesn’t particularly like loops.

Bunny’s the one to break the silence, “You should probably be inside. ‘ts your party after all.”

Jack pitches his voice a bit higher and fills it with as much humor as possible, “Don’t tell me what to do."

He’s not sure Bunny gets it, so he laughs a bit at himself before kicking his foot again, tightening the arm around his knee.

“I know...I just…” He stops himself, tries to find the words that won’t make Bunny think less of him than he already does. “It’s a bit...much. Y’know? Just for...what? Five years? That’s nothing to you guys.”

“Five years of Guardianship,” Bunny says with an odd tone to his voice.

Jack nods, chewing his thumbnail as he tried to figure out what he was getting at, “And? I mean, it’s not like...I…” He trails off, waving his hand aimlessly by his head. “It’s not like we celebrate _your_ years of Guardianship.”

Bunny makes a strange noise in the back of his throat which Jack chooses to interpret as a laugh, “No, and we’re all grateful for that. Don’t go givin’ North any more ideas for parties.”

Jack chuckles a bit, and then freezes as Bunny’s elbow hits his side in a quick jab.

“Come on back in, they’re going to notice we’re gone soon and I’d rather not hear North’s two hour lecture on party etiquette again.”

There’s something in Jack’s throat. He’s probably getting sick, no matter how absurd the idea might be. Or maybe he swallowed a stray lump of coal by accident. He’s going to die from coal poisoning, there’s no other explanation.

He nods, swallows heavily, and then backflips himself over to the door.

“Last one inside is a rotten egg,” he calls, belatedly, as he yanks the door open.

He hears Bunny’s sigh and smiles.

 

OoOoO

 

It’s a quiet day (relatively speaking) at the Pole and Jack has been curled up in North’s favorite armchair for a few hours now, reading chapter after chapter of North’s personal notes on the development, use, and rules of magic. (He’d been pleasantly surprised to find that Jack could read Russian with little trouble, saving him the work and headache that would have been associated with translating his writing.) North himself is working on yet another blueprint, humming under his breath as he worked.

They’ve settled into a routine, and it works. 

  
Jack isn’t the person North pictured him to be for so long. For one, he’s perfectly content to sit and stare at page after page of theoretical notes for hours, as long as he has a few breaks to not-be-inside. For another, he’s then actually excited to discuss his readings with North, with so much enthusiasm and curiosity that North sometimes finds himself at a loss.

He hasn’t had someone to talk about magic with since. . .Ombric. It’s one of his passions, one of the reasons the Pole runs so well.

And North is still centuries (if not _millenia)_ behind the likes of Bunny and Sandy, so finding someone to talk with on his level is relieving.

A few years ago, back when they were still pretending that Jack was at the Pole for Guardianship training, North had been on very temporary bed rest after a nasty encounter with Krampus (it was a you-should-see-the-other-guy situation).

Jack had stopped by for their monthly meeting and found him in bed, wheedled the story out of him, and then lectured him for almost eight minutes straight about his downright hypocrisy (Jack’s words, not North’s) in teaching Jack to reach out to the four of them for help and then not doing so himself.

North was not surprised to see tears in Jack’s eyes at the end of the speech.

Even at that point in time he’d long given up being surprised when faced with Jack’s loyalty (perhaps the thing he was least prepared for when the young spirit first joined them).

So now they sit and North works and Jack learns and they chat - sometimes aimlessly - and _it works_.

 

OoOoO

 

Tooth and North are the ones to storm the fortress as Sandy keeps the enemy’s attention on his sand outside.

They fight with a zeal and single-mindedness that should have, by all accounts, been whittled away by the years.

When Tooth aims high, North aims low. They are in sync as attack after attack gets thrown their way by an increasingly desperate spring spirit. The vines that sprout are almost immediately cut off by a sword from one Guardian or the other, and the buzzing insects are much too overgrown to avoid the blades.

When they finally find Bunny and Jack, the blood covers their blades and faces and an odd mixture of flowery scents is mixed in with the iron.

They’re both alright, a little shaken and beaten up (Jack has a busted lip, and Bunny’s limping), but _okay_.

Sandy joins them, angry spirit in tow, and they just breath for a little while. North avoids hugging their recently released teammates due to the mess, but just barely.

They take threats a bit more seriously after that.

 

OoOoO

 

Bunny wishes he wasn’t surprised when he finds his regular intruder slumped against a wall near the continent tunnels, chin and hoodie covered in blood and leg at an awkward angle that makes him suspect a fracture of some kind.

The violence has gotten worse recently, and Sandy dropped by not to long ago to ask Bunny to watch out for Jack a bit more than usual.   

Looks like Sandy was right again.

Bunny is proud of how he’s mostly able to keep the slight panic out of his voice when he finally reaches Jack’s side.

“‘Ay mate, that don’t look good.”

Jack grimaces, which was probably supposed to be a smile, “No, not exactly,” he mumbles before turning to spit a mouthful of blood in the grass.

“Broken nose ‘n leg? Prolly not,” Bunny said, crouching down, “Who was it this time?”

There’s a slight delay before Jack answers, “What do you mean ‘this time’?”

“Don’t you avoid it. Sandy stopped by, asked me to keep an eye out. Looks like it was for a good reason.”

Jack mumbles a, “Traitor,” before trying to push himself into a more upright position.

“Easy mate, let’s get you to a bed.” He only has his nest, but it’s close enough.

There’s another grimace and a slurred, “Shaddup Aster,” which just supports Bunny’s suspicion of concussion.

Bunny leans down to take Jack’s weight, trying to move as slowly as possible. Immortal injuries aren’t usually as bad as they would be otherwise, but they’re still just as painful.

Jack passes out after a couple of carefully slow steps.

He sighs and tries to even out his breathing as he pulls Jack close to his chest and starts the journey to his den. Panicking won’t help anybody.

 

OoOoO

 

Tooth’s taken to collecting teeth once again, at least every once in a while.

It’s nice, almost relaxing in a way. She’d forgotten what it was like to see the children’s faces and picture their excitement.

Jack changed that. Pitch changed that.

Then the Guardians changed.

She thinks that Sandy might be the only other one who has noticed the breadth of change that has occurred.

The very world they live in has changed - the balance tipped too far, and far too many trying to grab at power and position. Politics in the world of spirits are complicated, and something she and the other Guardians like to stay out of. Things have changed though, and tensions have risen, spirits have become aggressive toward them, and they’re so much _happier_.

It’s something that’s taken time, but Tooth is certain she’s never seen Bunny smile as much _ever_ as he has in the past few years. It’s a change, and a nice one.

And maybe it’s backward - being happy when things become complicated and hard and their very _Guardianship_ is threatened, but that’s how it is.

Things are _okay_ in a way that Tooth forgot could exist.

 

OoOoO

 

When Jack finally finds his way back to consciousness, he’s warm. And confused. And very comfortable.

He doesn’t open his eyes, trying to hold on to the feeling.

Eventually voices filter into his perception and he acknowledges the fact that he’s definitely fallen asleep against Bunny and it was probably Sandy’s fault and also he still doesn’t want to move.

But he probably should . . . soon. He will. Eventually.

It’s just that the party is exhausting and he’s _warm_ and the thing that usually has his stomach tied up in knots is gone for the moment and . . .

He’s well aware that he’s making excuses, and becoming more aware of the fact that the voices he can hear are not the ones he’s used to.

He vaguely curses Sandy in his head, making a mental note to get revenge for the dreamsand that had _definitely_ not been an accident (hitting someone in the face when in the middle of a rather dramatic argument was on purpose, no matter what Sandy would inevitably plead).

“. . . kinda cute,” one of the voices nearby murmurs.

“C’mon . . . just . . . stuck-up . . . Guardians,” another voice argues, a little more aggravated than the first.

The voices wander off, and Jack is violently reminded about the reason for strange immortal beings being in North’s workshop.

(It’s been there, niggling at the back of his brain. He probably wouldn’t forget the passionate not-argument he’d had to hold with the Guardians a few months back for a long time.)

He manages to open his eyes, blinking the film and stickiness away, and pushes himself to a sitting position, shoving Bunny’s shoulder along the way.

“Bunny. Dude. Wake up.” His voice is raw and a little deeper than normal, and his brain is still not at a hundred percent. He kind of hates sleep. A little. Also, he loves it.

It’s a love-hate relationship.

Bunny just makes a weird shuffle motion and shoves his face tighter into the crease between the arm and back of the couch.

Jack sighs, stretching his arms out and popping his knuckles. His staff is stuck in the sofa crack and Bunny is half on top of it. A couple of spirits wander by, chatting loudly, and Jack brings a palm to his eyes to rub the sand out of them.

He yawns. Dreamsand tends to make him incredibly sleepy for a long time (as far as he and North can tell, it’s because he’s tied so closely to a season, and seasonal spirits tend to go months on end without sleeping until they crash for hibernation), and he’s probably not going to be completely awake for at least another ten minutes.

Another slap to Bunny’s shoulder yields no results, so he reaches over him and tugs an ear.

He gets kicked off the couch, but it wakes Aster up, so it works out.

“. . . Sandy, that ratbag,” Bunny grinds out after giving Jack a hand up and smoothing his fur out from where it’d been angled weirdly from being smushed into the couch.

Jack yawns again, which makes Bunny yawn, which makes Jack yawn again.

“Yeah,” Jack says when he’s finally able to speak, “Should probably get on that. Revenge. Making friends. Relieving the intense political pressures that are changing the makeup of the governing powers within the immortal community. You know.”

Bunny snorts a bit, twists his back to pop it, and then rolls his eyes, “Alright. Let’s get on that.”

They head off, and Jack’s already got a snowball in hand.

Revenge was the easiest of those options.

 

OoOoO

 

Sandy finds himself with company often now.

It’s usually Jack, talking a mile a minute, diving on and off of Sandy’s cloud, following trails of dreamsand. Sometimes it’s Jack again, but a quieter version - the one where he sits and watches, signs instead of talks (between Sandy’s glyphs and Jack’s signing and their reciprocity via dreamsand-dusted hands or bursts of frost respectively, they’ve found a language that works between them), dozes and dreams of days filled with laughter.

But now, sometimes there are spirits - shy or bold, hesitant and confident in equal measures - approaching him, reaching out.

This is, perhaps, the thing most surprising about the changes that Jack has wrought among them - a new sense of comradery between immortals, communication and networks.

A few parties, some gifts, and a lot of conversation have gone a long way.

 

OoOoO

 

Jack wanders in one day, lands nearby, and sends a burst of cold air through Aster’s fur.

“Oi, keep the cold out! I’m tryin’ to keep my plants alive here!” He calls, eyes on the sprouts he’s trying to coax to bloom.

There’s a shift in the wind, and then a, “sorry,” close to his shoulder. He twitches his ear in acknowledgement, his eyes closed so as to better focus on the _life_ flowing through the soil and into the roots.

If it was anyone else bothering him, he’d probably kick them out within the space of time it would have taken them to say ‘hello’. Growing his googies is a delicate art, and his eggs are perishables. The timing has to be exactly right, the soil has to be exactly the right temperature and nutrient density.

The eggs should really be a burden on him to grow, but it isn’t. He’s enjoyed gardening for centuries, and egg shapes for longer.

(The googie plants are of the spare few that survived the change into earth’s atmosphere when his ship landed. They’re especially special.)

And while he would usually never speed up their growth with anyone else around, the Warren’s taken to Jack without any input by Aster (well, maybe a little), and his magical signature is integrated easily into the pool of power. When Aster tugs, carefully, slowly, the plants get a miniscule portion of Jack’s magic along with that of the birthplace of spring.

Aster takes pride in the small gasp he elicits from Jack when the plants finally decide to soak up the strength he’s offering. They finally sprout up, and the beginnings of the bulbs form. He cuts them off then, quickly. It wouldn’t do for the googies to pop out this early.

He takes a steadying breath, surprised by the fact that he didn’t feel the loss of power as much as usual. As he turns to face Jack, he understands why.

“You’re overflowin’ today, ain’tcha?” He questions, quirking an eyebrow.

Jack blinks at him, a couple times, looks down at himself, shakes his head like he’s clearing out fog.

“I am?”

“Looks like. Think even the googies got some of it.”

The immediate change from bleary-eyed to dismayed is enough to worry Aster.

“They did? I’m so-so sorry - I didn’t-” Jack’s backing up from him now, eyes wide and hands flapping.

“Easy mate,” he says, calmly, as he starts the walk toward the next field, “didn’t say it was a bad thing. Googies could probably use some toughening up. She’ll be apples.”

“Still don’t know what you mean by that,” Jack intones, floating lazily next to Aster.

Aster snorts and shakes his head. Jack’s known what he means since year eleven or so, but it’s just a part of their thing.

They’d gotten over the awkwardness not too long after they bonded over their mutual antagonism with the groundhog, and shortly before they were kidnapped together. Now, it’s mostly light hearted teasing and patching each other up after fights because the yetis tend to go overboard with everything, including medical care (no wonder they get along with North so well).

Sometimes there’s falling asleep next to each other on a couch at the Pole or friendly competitions that span multiple continents too, but they tend not to talk about those, for varying reasons.

And it should have been harder than it was to fall into this rhythm they have - years of bad blood and grudges, a seeming betrayal, the fact that both of them are terrible with emotions - but it’s okay. Jack can stop by the Warren and Bunny can search him out and it’s not weird, except for the fact that neither of them are good at this _friendship_ thing and it shouldn’t work as well as it does.

“It’s okay if I hang around then, yeah?” Jack questions as Bunny crouches down next to the next plot.

“Yeah. Could prolly use a bit of a boost myself, to be honest.”

Jack grins at that, a little sleepily, “Well, I’ve got plenty to share around.”

“Heh, where was it this time?”

“Canada again. And also a bunch of kids in South Africa? Guess the legend’s getting around again there.”

“Looks like. Let’s hope there’s no shapeshifting this time around though,” Bunny states, wryly.

Jack laughs a bit, sits cross-legged on the grass, “Well, guess it’s good thing we’ve got an expert on hope then.”

 

OoOoO

 

Pitch escapes his self-made prison a little over thirty years later, understandably pissed.

He’s erratic, plaguing cities and towns with nightmares at random, and once, trying to attack the Pole single handed. It makes a mess of their globes and the psyches of some poor children, and they don’t catch up to him for a long time.

It’s Jack and Bunny and Tooth that get caught in his trap - acting as protectorates of the Tooth Fairies as they go about the business of collecting teeth while North focuses on Christmas preparations and Sandy does as much damage control as he can.

It could have ended much worse than it does if Tooth hadn’t been as good as she is at separating lies from painful truth, but thankfully for everyone involved, she manages to escape the fear spell and stall Pitch long enough for Sandy to show up and throw down with the new tools he’d developed since the last fight (inspired by Jack and the children who’d saved them).

Pitch is in lock down somewhere in the maze that is Sandy’s castle within the hour, and celebrations are in order.

(Jack and Bunny don’t sleep for six months, and when they do, it’s because Sandman tracks the two of them down and doses each of them with enough dreamsand to knock a flying elephant off its feet. Tooth doesn’t do so much as doze for more than a year.)

 

OoOoO

 

“Smile Jack! Is picture time!” North calls exuberantly, waving a camera wildly.

Jack responds by darting over to where Bunny is sitting and leaning over the back of the couch, sticking out his tongue and putting two fingers behind the Pooka’s head.

Bunny’s eye roll is in sync with the flash of the camera, and Tooth giggles, hovering just behind North’s head.

“I’m not drunk enough for this,” Bunny complains.

“You’re not EVEN drunk,” Jack retorts, “None of us are. There is no alcohol. No Siree.” He follows up this proclamation by draping himself completely across the back of the couch and breaking into a giggle fit that’s muffled by Bunny’s shoulder, which has the unfortunate luck of being in the perfect place for Jack to rest his head on.

Sandy waves and slightly askew glyphs float above his head as he signs “Fun is the same bad thing,” before silently laughing at his own fingers.

Jack signs a  “Not my fault,” then curls his fingers to form Ns and uses them to shape a beard in the air in front of him, "North's fault." He lets his finger trail off into Bunny’s fur as he finishes the sign, tracing abstract shapes into the fur as he smooshes his face in-between the couch and Bunny’s back.

There’s no retort from North, possibly because he’s more preoccupied with the camera and trying to find the setting that will capture Tooth’s wings without blurring.

Three of the five of them fall asleep there, and Sandy dusts them with dreamsand while Tooth is busy taking blackmail worthy pictures.

 

OoOoO

 

Sandy and Jack have a conversation once. It’s about Pitch and about fear and about the long and dramatic history of one Kozmotis Pitchiner. For Jack, it’s a little confusing and a little eye-opening, and a little bit like a punch to the face.

“Pitch used to be good?” Jack signs, raising his pointer finger in a question marker.

“Yes, a long time ago,” Sandy replies, a sand-formed beard growing above his head.

“Wow.”

There’s a lack of signs for a long time after that.

Jack finally sits up, faces Sandy with determination, “Can we change Pitch?” He’s chewing his lip and misses the question marker, hands shaking slightly.

A moment passes before Sandy raises a finger to his chest, “I'm trying now”

Jack’s eyebrows raise before furrowing, “No danger?” He questions, adding a few more movements to the danger sign than necessary.

Sandy shrugs.

Jack pokes him, forcefully, “If you need help, ask me.”

“Ok.”

 

OoOoO

 

Bunny sings sometimes, never in a language Jack knows.

He’s found that he enjoys wandering into the Warren now and then (definitely not just when he feels lonely or anything). Sometimes he’ll find a tree or statue to sit in until Bunny inevitably comes to ask him what he’s doing there, but other times, he wanders until he finds Aster.

Sometimes he’s tending to the plants, and sometimes he makes Jack help him do so, and sometimes he’s sitting, knitting or painting or sewing or writing in a hardbound book with letters that make Jack’s head spin just looking at them.

Sometimes he sings - softly, and only when it’s obvious he’s almost forgotten Jack’s there.

Jack likes it when Aster sings. It makes the Warren seem soft and safe.

(The flowers tend to reach out toward Bunny, and even the trees like to sway.)

And when Aster remembers that Jack’s there, he’ll suddenly stop and make an excuse about needing to fix a river’s pathway or mix a new color or tend to the egg vines or needing to do _something_ in the Warren that’s not where Jack is.

The thing is, they’re all valid reasons, so Jack can’t quite call him out on it (Easter is a once a year job, but preparing for it is not).

Plus, he’s hung around North long enough to hear a lot of Bunny’s story (North is a notorious gossip - Jack’s sure he’s found out more about other spirits from North than any other source).

So Jack lets it go, and doesn’t ask questions or plead for more. Yet. He might. Someday.

 

OoOoO

 

“Buuuuuuuuneeeey,” Jack complains as he’s hauled through the workshop, “I don’t wanna!” He pitches his voice high and even attempts to kick at Bunny’s shins.

He knows without looking that he’s just had eyes rolled in his general direction, but he keeps his frown on his face as he’s dragged, very much against his will, toward the meeting room.

“I hate people. You hate people. Let’s skip and go get fro-yo!”

“These are important people.”

“So? I skip out on important people all the time! Phil and North and Sandy and Tooth. . . Join me in delinquency! You know you want tooooooo!”

Bunny sighs and grabs Jack’s leg from where he’s wrapped it around a banister.

“That wasn’t a no! We’re not there yet! We could still escape!”

There’s another sigh, then a quiet, “Don’t tempt me.”

“ASOCIAL BUDDIES FOREVER!” Jack is well aware that he’s being as bratty as possible. It’s never worked out for him before, but he believes strongly in second chances (twenty-third chances?).

“There’s just a couple of blokes here to talk about some magic quest. We probably won’t even have to do much else than introduce ourselves,” Bunny tries to rationalize.

Jack gives up on delaying and lets Bunny’s arm guide him to the meeting room and reaches for his staff that had been previously confiscated from him by the other arm. Bunny gives it to him, silent warning hidden in his hesitation and raised eyebrows.

Jack just sighs, twitches his mouth.

Bunny hands it over and they enter the meeting room side by side.

Of course, with the staff factored in, this means they get awkwardly stuck in the doorway, shoulder to shoulder, but the show of solidarity was nice.

 

OoOoO

 

It’s New Year’s and Jack is hanging off the arm of a couch, upside down, with his feet pressed up against Sandy’s side and his hair soaking wet because of the proximity to fire he’s experiencing.

“Jack, you are dripping all over.”

“Just melting a bit. Let me have this.”

North lets it go, not particularly interested in broaching that topic again. Warmth and being warm are touchy subjects with Jack, even after all these years. And sure, they could discuss it for hours on end, like any topic you could think of, but North’s very comfortable in his armchair with his mug of hot cocoa and doesn’t particularly want to rile himself up.

“You could melt elsewhere, you know,” Bunny complains, digging an elbow into Jack’s side.

“And you could exist elsewhere. So?”

“I was here first! You’re the one that laid down on top of me.”

“Boys,” Tooth warns in between directions to her mini-fairies, “guard the children, not act like them.”

There’s a grumble from both of them, completely rehearsed, but they quiet down.

Later, Phil will find them all there, Tooth issuing quiet orders, Sandy bobbing in place, North still gazing at the fire, and Bunny and Jack both sound asleep in what look like extremely uncomfortable positions.

The tree, full of the ornaments the Guardians made two years ago, is still twinkling in the corner, reflecting light off of eggs and snowflakes and feathers and sand-crafted shapes. There’s a stack of photo albums as tall as Sandy in the other corner.

North meets his eye, smiles.

Phil closes the door, walks away.

And when the others look to him with hope in their eyes, he smiles and nods.

They’re happy.

 

**Author's Note:**

> crit is welcome, esp. b/c this is unbetaed. 
> 
> many thanks to Лемуроглаз for catching my Russian mistakes <3
> 
> Happy Holidays everybody!
> 
> feel free to come chat with me on [ the tumbs ](http://sprinkles888.tumblr.com)


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